SLIS 5420 Edward Tulane

Week Five: Fantasy – The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane

Book Summary: 

            Edward Tulane is a china rabbit owned by a little girl named Abilene, who adores him even though he does not care about anyone.  He is egotistical and unfeeling.  Abilene takes Edward on a cruise where he is thrown overboard by destructive boys, and his journey to realizing that life is all about love begins. 

            Edward lives in a variety of places with a variety of types of people, none of which have much money, which is quite unlike his original home.  They do all love him just as much though.  Each one needs him tremendously.  He lives with an older couple, a hobo, a sick girl and her brother, and then ends up in an expensive doll shop waiting and waiting for the love he has finally understood to find him again.  

APA Reference:  

DiCamillo, K. (2006). The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane. Cambridge, MA:  Candlewick Press.  

My Impressions: 

            I was really looking forward to this story.  A book about a toy rabbit with enchanting artwork seemed like it could become a favorite, but it just wasn’t quite there.  The illustrations by Bagram Ibatoulline are breathtakingly beautiful.  I mostly enjoyed the story of Edward Tulane, but not because of Edward at all.  Quite the opposite of what I was expecting, I fell in love with the characters the china rabbit encounters throughout the years, but at several points in the story practically despised Edward himself.  Even when the protagonist of a story is not a “good guy,” I typically still see the character as the one who I cheer for.  Edward Tulane was different.  He was self-centered and unloving. 

            I gasped when his original owner, a little girl named Abiline, watched as horrible boys threw her rabbit overboard while on a cruise, even though it was for her alone and not for the rabbit at the bottom of the sea.  My heart jumped when the daughter of his new owner, Nellie, came and threw “Susanna,” the happiness of Nellie and Lawrence’s lives, in the dump.  At this point, Edward, although he was referred to as a girl, was happier than he had ever been and begins to understand love.  This is the point when the reader is supposed to begin to feel for Edward, and I did.  Edward becomes part of a wonderful life for Bull and Lucy, a hobo and his dog, and then is discarded by someone who doesn’t care, yet again. 

            It is somewhat sad that each time Edward realizes he can affect people’s lives, and he begins to feel, he is torn from his owner and discarded, sometimes in violent ways. The story was decent at points and heartbreaking in others, but no person affects Edward’s life, nor mine, as much as Sarah Ruth.  Bryce, her older brother, brings Edward, now named Jangles, to her after finding him hanging as a scarecrow.  Sarah Ruth is quite ill, and her part of Edward’s story is the most heartbreaking to read.  Of all of the people who come into Edward’s life, she is the most affecting.  She is the one who stayed with me long after I finished the book.  Although her story is a small part of Edward’s world, this little girl leaves an impression. 

            This story is rather realistic in parts, and left me really feeling for the characters.  As a work of fantasy, it is well written because of the point of view being from Edward’s perspective.  This story easily could have been written in a way that told only what was happening to Edward, but the real core of the story is supposed to be the transformation Edward takes from selfish and uncaring to loving and finding his way home again.  I did enjoy the circle ending, and I did feel Edward’s story was worth being told.  I just felt Sarah Ruth, Abilene, and all Edward’s “owners” stories around Edward were much more amazing.

            

Professional Review: 

Edward Tulane is a china rabbit with real rabbit-fur ears and tail, a sumptuous wardrobe, and a pampered life with Abilene Tulane, the little girl who loves him. Her devotion isn’t returned. Edward’s heart is as chilly as his china body until his fortune changes and he spends some time in the muck at the bottom of the ocean. He passes through several hands over the years, found first by an elderly fisherman and his wife. With them, he learns to listen and to remember the stories they whisper to him, and his heart for the first time begins to wake up. Edward’s journey continues—he spends time in a garbage dump, travels around with a hobo and his dog, and lives with several others, learning to love those who love him. DiCamillo writes tenderly and lyrically but with restraint, keeping a tight focus on Edward’s experience and gradual awakening. The book is physically beautiful as well, with cream-colored pages and a generous number of illustrations. Ibatoulline’s appropriately old-fashioned sepia-toned drawings and full-color plates, which possess the same poignant quality as DiCamillo’s prose, ground the fanciful story in a realistic setting. Although Edward (like the Velveteen Rabbit his story can’t help but bring to mind) is the worse for wear, a happy ending awaits him.

Lempke, S. (2006). The miraculous journey of Edward Tulane [Review of The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane by K. 
          DiCamillo]. Horn Book Magazine, 2(2), 184-185. Retrieved from http://www.hbook.com

This achingly beautiful story shows a true master of writing at her very best. Edward Tulane is an exceedingly vain, cold-hearted china rabbit owned by 10-year-old Abilene Tulane, who dearly loves him. Her grandmother relates a fairy tale about a princess who never felt love; she then whispers to Edward that he disappoints her. His path to redemption begins when he falls overboard during the family's ocean journey. Sinking to the bottom of the sea where he will spend 297 days, Edward feels his first emotion-fear. Caught in a fisherman's net, he lives with the old man and his wife and begins to care about his humans. Then their adult daughter takes him to the dump, where a dog and a hobo find him. They ride the rails together until Edward is cruelly separated from them. His heart is truly broken when next owner, four-year-old Sarah Ruth, dies. He recalls Abilene's grandmother with a new sense of humility, wishing she knew that he has learned to love. When his head is shattered by an angry man, Edward wants to join Sarah Ruth but those he has loved convince him to live. Repaired by a doll store owner, he closes his heart to love, as it is too painful, until a wise doll tells him that he that he must open his heart for someone to love him. This superb book is beautifully written in spare yet stirring language. The tender look at the changes from arrogance to grateful loving is perfectly delineated. Ibatoulline's lovely sepia-toned gouache illustrations and beautifully rendered color plates are exquisite. An ever-so-marvelous tale.

Gray, B. (2006). The miraculous journey of Edward Tulane [Review of The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane by K. 
          DiCamillo]. School Library Journal, 52(2), 95.Retrieved from http://www.schoollibraryjournal.com/

Library Uses: 

            This book would be a great addition to a book talk of fantasy books or books where the main character is an animal or toy.  I used it in my book talk where the theme tying the different books together was loss.